Aesthetic Closure of Maxillary and Mandibular Anterior Spaces Using Direct Composite Resin Build-Ups: A Case Report

The presence of multiple spaces in the anterior aesthetic zone can produce discomfort for patients and its treatment can be difficult for dental professionals. A variety of treatment options are available and these include orthodontic movement, prosthetic indirect restorations or direct composite resin build-ups. Among these, the closure of interdental spaces using composite build-ups combined with orthodontic treatment is considered to be most conservative. This type of treatment has several advantages like the maximum preservation of tooth substance (no tooth preparation), no need for anesthesia, no multiple time-consuming visits, no provisional restorations and also comparably low costs. Clinical Consideration: This case report describes the clinical restorative procedure of direct composite resin build-ups for the closure of multiple anterior spaces

Functional abnormalities in induced Pluripotent Stem Cell-derived cardiomyocytes generated from titin-mutated patients with dilated cardiomyopathy

<div><p>Aims</p><p>Dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM), a myocardial disorder that can result in progressive heart failure and arrhythmias, is defined by ventricular chamber enlargement and dilatation, and systolic dysfunction. Despite extensive research, the pathological mechanisms of DCM are unclear mainly due to numerous mutations in different gene families resulting in the same outcome—decreased ventricular function. Titin (<i>TTN</i>)—a giant protein, expressed in cardiac and skeletal muscles, is an important part of the sarcomere, and thus <i>TTN</i> mutations are the most common cause of adult DCM. To decipher the basis for the cardiac pathology in titin-mutated patients, we investigated the hypothesis that induced Pluripotent Stem Cell (iPSC)-derived cardiomyocytes (iPSC-CM) generated from patients, recapitulate the disease phenotype. The hypothesis was tested by 3 Aims: (1) Investigate key features of the excitation-contraction-coupling machinery; (2) Investigate the responsiveness to positive inotropic interventions; (3) Investigate the proteome profile of the AuP cardiomyocytes using mass-spectrometry (MS).</p><p>Methods and results</p><p>iPSC were generated from the patients' skin fibroblasts. The major findings were: (1) Sarcomeric organization analysis in mutated iPSC-CM showed defects in assembly and maintenance of sarcomeric structure. (2) Mutated iPSC-CM exhibited diminished inotropic and lusitropic responses to β-adrenergic stimulation with isoproterenol, increased [Ca²⁺]_out and angiotensin-II. Additionally, mutated iPSC-CM displayed prolonged recovery in response to caffeine. These findings may result from defective or lack of interactions of the sarcomeric components with titin through its kinase domain which is absent in the mutated cells.</p><p>Conclusions</p><p>These findings show that the mutated cardiomyocytes from DCM patients recapitulate abnormalities of the inherited cardiomyopathies, expressed as blunted inotropic response.</p></div